GLEN BURNIE, Md. — People come to the big laundry on Ritchie Highway to wash their clothes or to cash checks, but it was the latter, which caught the attention of an armed robber who targeted a victim who left the store with cash and headed for his car in the parking lot when he was intercepted.
"That subject said, 'Hey, I just saw you cash these checks. Give me your cash,'" said Sgt. Jacklyn Davis of the Anne Arundel County Police Department. “The victim gave him the cash, and then the suspect demanded the victim's car and other personal property. At that point, the victim said 'no', started screaming and fighting back a little bit, not physically, but outwardly calling for help and our suspect took off running."
Whether the handgun wasn't real, wasn't loaded or the robber just wasn't prepared to pull the trigger, police don't know, but they know the victim's ill-advised screams worked this time.
"We don't see many where our victims fight back,” said Davis. “This case it worked. It's not something that we would advocate for. It's just money. It's just a car. It's not worth your life, but in this case, it worked out for our victim thankfully."
The 7-Eleven on Baltimore Annapolis Boulevard in Glen Burnie set the stage for another theft, but in this case, police say a man later identified as 21-year-old Eric Powell, Jr. posed as a panhandler and asked a customer leaving the store if he could spare a dollar.
When the victim pulled out his wallet to help him out, the suspect decided to help himself in a snatch-and-run.
"Suspect ran away with the wallet, but dropped his cellphone,” said Davis, “The suspect decided at that point that he couldn't live without his cell phone, had to go back and get it, goes back to get it. Our officers were already in route and located him very close to the crime scene there. He was positively identified and charged with robbery, assault, theft."
The victim in that case got into a physical struggle with Powell over the wallet, and that's when the suspect lost his cellphone.
